One Hundred Times
by Cavallo Alato
Summary: 100 Themes: A world that revolves around Tsukuyo and Zenshi...most of the time. Snippets involving Zen and Tsukki, our "Eyes of Wolves" cast, and the world of Gintama. Slices of life in any realm - near, far, on Earth, or in space. Little ideas that come together.
1. One Ten

A one hundred themes challenge that I entertain myself with from time to time. Fifty are done. I'll post ten at a time so you don't have to go through a gazillion of these at once lol.

Featuring mainly Tsukuyo and Zenshi, but with many snippets from other **Eyes of Wolves** characters + Gintama folk.

_New characters may include:_

a) Limona - she's a young Amanto secretary that will appear in another short Zenshi/Tsukuyo story I'm working on (it revolves around the newest manga chapters about the Aizen Kou stuff haha)

b) Yugao. You'll see who she is...or you might already know. :D

**Disclaimer: Gintama characters belong to Sorachi Hideaki. All those random Amanto/Yato/random people are mine haha.**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

**_.: one ten :._**

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**1\. Smile**

"Relax," Mei says, "We're here to _talk_."

The three Amanto fidget nervously, the one in the center with the curled ram horns balling his fists around a scroll.

"You Harusame seem to have a different definition of _talk_ than most of us," the center man replies. A bead of sweat rolls down his face, but he refuses to abjure his solemn pride in the face of the universe's most infamous crime syndicate.

"Oh no, not me," Mei reassures him. "I love a lil' chit-chat."

She smiles, but it's not a smile people like to see. It's harsh and abrasive in a manner that exudes brilliant cheer. If there is anyone who can strike fear in the hearts of men with the sweetest of smiles, it is Mei.

She touches the hilt of her umbrella.

"So about those terms…"

**2\. Pain**

Tabs finds out the hard way that he has a very low pain tolerance. Surprisingly enough, his life is not in danger when it happens, and that's what costs him the week of teasing he'll never live down. Unfortunately, the one who found him lying unconscious on the floor after stubbing his toe on a particularly hard door — a stubborn titanium sliding door that refused to open automatically — was not the taciturn Lieutenant Zenshi, but instead, good ole Mei and their one and only captain, Kamui.

"You _stubbed your toe_." It's not a question, and Mei doesn't intend it to be.

"Yes," Tabs answers after a hesitation. He glances nervously at Kamui. To be honest, he's surprised the boy hasn't thrown him off the ship yet.

And then, most unexpectedly, Kamui says:

"It's a hard door, after all."

**3\. Sad**

Yagyuu Kyuubei is prone to bouts of depression that abbreviate the amount of time she is able to spend with others. She cannot stand the touch of a man and can't seem to let go of Otae, who is the most patient girl on their humble planet.

She most especially cannot stand being guarded by Toujou at all hours of the day, and discovers herself wandering the streets of Edo alone. About ten minutes into her walk, she finds that the absence of Otae and Toujou makes the streets both wider and narrower. The former feeling is because she realizes she is lonely; the latter because people crowd closer to her.

She bumps shoulders with a tall Amanto man who apologizes in a low voice and briefly touches her shoulder. His fingers trail softly, lighter than a feather, across the fabric of her jacket but immediately Kyuubei whirls around, seizes the man by the wrist, and attempts to fling him up the street.

To her surprise, she loses her grip on him the moment contact is made. Slightly baffled, Kyuubei reins in her instinctive aggression and evaluates the situation. The tall, dark-haired man is somewhat familiar, but she cannot recall from where. He stares with a passive, blank expression that is both concerned but distant all at once.

"If you're sad, it's best to talk to someone close to you."

"Wha—"

"I hope you don't make a habit out of wrestling strangers to the ground," he says. The man props up an umbrella over his head and continues on his way as if an exchange had not occurred between them.

Kyuubei, stunned, watches him go.

And then reverses direction and runs to the Shimura dojo.

**4\. Lollipop**

Zenshi has all the patience in the world, but the onerous charge that is Mei will never cease to frustrate him. So when he peers into one of the conference rooms and she is spread-eagled, face-down on the table, he debates either leaving her there cold or splashing a bucket of ice water over her head.

In the end, he knows only sugar will keep her awake, and leaves a large, swirly lollipop at her side.

But he still leaves here there cold.

**5\. Procrastinate**

The stack of papers on his desk is of formidable size. It never occurred to him that paperwork could be so menacing. Yet there it is, the folder of negotiations with Planet Xansqu's King Belphegor. For the most part, he is rather averse to arranging a meeting with the bizarre king, who is known for his bloodthirsty killing sprees and bone-chilling smiles. So Zenshi pushes the stack aside, for a brief moment pretending it doesn't exist.

His procrastination does not pass unnoticed by Kougi, who puts a mug of tea on his desk with a dubious glance.

"You're going to fill those out, right?"

"Eventually."

An hour passes, and he still browses through an unimportant complaint filed by Prince Hata.

"Zenshi." Kougi carefully slides the stack his way. "Seriously."

Sighing, Zenshi picks up his pen and takes a glance at the papers. But then, just as quickly, he changes his mind again.

"Maybe later."

**6\. Rain**

The Hyakka often have trouble following their leader in those daring heels of theirs. Tsukuyo is capable of surviving melees and gunfights in those heels, and nothing will stop her.

Unless it rains.

The day the Hyakka leader gets too far ahead of her squad, slips in the rain, and twists her ankle is the day she curses those heels. Sitting dejectedly in an alley, the gutter next to her brimming with mud and debris washed down the street by the rain, Tsukuyo sulks and shivers. The storm is almost malevolent, increasing in speed and ferociousness and eating away at the temperature without hindrance.

In the distance, Tsukuyo hears a few women shout "_Kashira! _Where are you?!" but their voices are lost to the whipping wind.

Her right ankle burning, stiffened, and swelling up, Tsukuyo can only wait until the pain subsides and the clouds part. Rain, for Yoshiwara, was a novel occurrence. Back when Hosen kept the roof over their City of the Night an eternal dark cover, rain had never been an issue unless one traveled above ground. Hinowa had been fond of telling stories of a time she'd seen the rain. They never knew it was the time she'd attempted to run away with Seita.

Tsukuyo leans against the filthy alley wall, the brick's uneven surface catching on the silk of her kimono. The temperature drops even further, her limbs grow heavy, and soon her eyelids are closing.

When she awakens, her entire body is warm and light and clean, and someone is rubbing warmth into her hands. It takes a good moment or two for Tsukuyo to regain consciousness, but when she does, she spots Zenshi in a large, blue hoodie and khaki slacks — which clash oddly on him — no socks and dripping with rainwater. His hands are the only thing dry about him, warm and comforting as they clasp hers gently.

The first thing Tsukuyo can think to say is:

"Ya didn't wear _that_ outside, did ya?"

**7\. Pepper**

Seita is the kitchen's public enemy number one.

Seita should not be within ten feet of a kitchen utensil.

Especially not the stove.

But yet somehow he snoops about without Hinowa's position at the crack of dawn, attempting to make a great omelet for mother's day. He has a green bell pepper in his left hand and a huge cleaver in his right.

He's about to chop his hand off because he lacks coordination when Zenshi swoops in from seemingly nowhere and redirects the enormous blade down onto the pepper instead of Seita's fingers.

Seita, visibly shaken, looks up.

"I guess I'm not going to be a swordsman, huh?"

**8\. Hide**

With momentous terror, Zenshi and Tsukuyo realize that their daughter is not just a little version of her mother. Little Yugao has more to say than just "Whatcha mean?" and "I'm hungwy." With her dark hair and propensity for wordless smiles, Yugao is as discreet as her father and horribly good at hiding.

It takes them three hours to find her, and she is literally a foot away.

Curled in a cupboard, asleep, rolled up with Lang the Amanto wolf-dog, is their little daughter Yugao.

**9\. Secret**

She has little secrets she probably will never tell anyone. Some of the things she thinks are discreet are rather obvious, but none of that matters. Tsukuyo secretly loves the way Zenshi tucks her into the crook of his body at night, when she lets him. She secretly loves the strength in his hands and the way he slides his fingertips up her waist.

When he asks why she is smiling to herself, Tsukuyo shakes her head.

"It's nothin'."

But he knows.

And that's his own secret.

**10\. Lock**

The door is locked and her heart beats at a frantic pace. Her tongue is dry, and an insipid but thick quiver of bile is rising up her throat. Her silver phone had dropped from her belt a ways back, and there was no turning around and grabbing it. Footsteps ring down the hall and she is desperate.

The kidnappers nearly have knives at Yugao's throat when a string of bullets runs straight through their skulls and drags them to the floor with brutal speed. Yugao's hand goes limp around the doorknob as Zenshi places her abandoned umbrella, torn and ripped, in her fingers.

"How'd ya get in?" she asks her father.

"Front door." Zenshi throws a glance over his shoulder — more footsteps. "They're closing in."

"How will we get out?"

Zenshi turns and touches the doorknob gently.

The door swings open.

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**Notes:**

-Zenshi is a hero. End of story. (proud laugh here)

-Zenshi only knew about Kyuubei because he got dragged to Club Smile again (lol?) and heard Otae worrying over her...

-HOW DOES ONE WRITE CASUAL KAMUI?! Kamui's adorbs.

**References: **

-Planet Xansqu and King Belphegor? It _screams_ Varia (KHR).

-I found the name Yugao (meaning moonflower) after seeing the character from Naruto again.

**Author's stuff:**

*** I had this crazy dream where Kagura and Kamui were the princess and crown prince (respectively) of the Yato planet...and there was a newsflash relaying across the city of some major royal crime and they weren't allowed outside...it was craaazyyyy!***


	2. Two Ten

Second set!

Some of these are kind of hard...the beginning, like, 25 or so are pretty good. I hope you like reading these...!

**Disclaimer: Gintama ****shippuuden ****is all Sorachi's.**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: two ten :.**_

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**11\. Dance**

Tsukuyo stiffens up immediately. Her grip on his left hand is a clenched prison, while her other hand stiffly curls around his sleeve. Zenshi's stance is casual but authoritative — he lets her proceed with her death grip, but lightly holds her arm up on both sides, his free hand just below her shoulder blade.

"No," Tsukuyo musters, as he glances down in hopes of nudging her in a specific direction.

"There's no one here," he chides lightly. Indeed, his office is empty as Kougi and the call-boy have gone home, and the lights are dimmed to let the natural hues of dusk fall in at an angle.

"_No_," she repeats, stubbornly indomitable.

Zenshi has already read her body position, and deduces that her stiffened stance will only allow her to blow over like the wind. He takes a step forward, forcing her to stagger backward. She stumbles and treads heavily on his toe but he ignores it.

"Zenshi—" she doesn't manage an entire sentence because he sweeps her gracefully in a circle.

"You're a natural," he tells her. There is a soft quirk to his lips, an almost smile that disappears as soon as Tsukuyo's glower comes on full force.

"I don't have time for this," she hisses. His right hand slides down to her lower back and draws her closer. Tsukuyo's breath catches in her throat, and her elbows lock as she tries to push him away. "Why're ya tryin' t—"

"I told you," Zenshi says, leaning down to whisper in her ear, "there's a formal ball coming up. I'd like you to come with me."

"I'm not goin' out into space ag'in," Tsukuyo snorts.

"Well at least learn to dance, then," Zenshi requests. He returns to a more formal ballroom dance position and leads her. Tsukuyo is surefooted enough to keep up, and soon they fall into a circular rhythm. Quick-quick-slow, quick-quick-slow. "I told you," Zenshi says, "you're a natural."

"I ain't no dancer," Tsukuyo mutters.

But Zenshi shakes his head, that small smile returning to his features, and gently twirls her in a circle.

**12\. Angry**

Yugao sits at the dinner table with a half-indignant half-terrified look on her face. She casts a glance around the circle, but her silent pleas are to no avail. Seita's hair, which resembles a bird's nest today, shrouds his face in mystery. He purposefully stares down at is bowl of miso soup as if it is the most intriguing thing on this side of the Milky Way. Hinowa gently flips through the Edo Times, and when Yugao catches her mother's eye, Tsukuyo only shrugs.

When Zenshi sits down between Seita and Yugao, the latter visibly flinches.

"You're late," Hinowa says. Yugao wants to run because she cannot fathom how Hinowa has the gall to tell him such a thing when he looks like he's about to murder a man.

"My bad," Zenshi replies smoothly. His face and voice tell nothing at all, but Yugao _knows_. She brushes her hair from her face and touches her chopsticks. Before anyone can express gratitude for the meal, Seita blurts out something that makes Yugao want to roast him for.

"So, Yugao-chan, how's your boyfriend?"

The girl's stomach nearly leaps out of her throat as the two older women turn to Seita sharply. He's about to ask what's wrong, but there is a glint in his eye that tells Yugao it was all a designed ploy. And, with her mother's temper, she pushes out of her chair and flings her chopsticks across the table.

They fly directly at Seita's face, but stop a mere millimeter from his nose. One Yato hand, clenched around the utensils, keeps them from gouging out Seita's eyeballs.

"U-um," Seita stutters, "Thanks…Zenshi…"

Zenshi hands the chopsticks back to his daughter, but the way his knuckles are white around the utensils tells more than his demure "No problem, Seita".

"He's g-good," Yugao replies nervously. "I mean, he's, uh, well."

"Isn't he the son of a ramen shop owner? Got any pictures?" Seita grins. Yugao, out of moves, decides not to look at her angry father.

"Well he isn't my _boyfriend_ exactly, he's—"

"He's what?" Zenshi cuts in. The table goes quiet, and even the softest clink of a spoon against china is jarring. To Yugao's surprise, neither Hinowa nor Tsukuyo have said a thing, and it's unsettling.

"He's more like a…a friend!"

"A friend." There are stiff undertones to her father's voice, and she knows exactly why. She may be half Yato and half Courtesan of Death, but that by no means justifies dating the son of a ramen shop owner and a…

Terrorist.

**13\. Rot**

There is something about the smell of rotting flesh that never ceases to amaze him. It's so brilliantly _disgusting_ that he can't help but rewind time mentally and picture the death and blood and gore that must have preceded such a repulsive sight. Indeed, the dead shall be indemnified for their loss of life; Kamui's smile is enough to send good graces their way, be it heaven or hell or the listless in-between.

The gradual wind-up of the ship's engine doesn't distract him from his thoughts because the potent smell of blood lingers on his clothes. As Sciuttla diminishes beneath them, he wonders how much of his old third-in-command he can distinguish. But the blood is rotten, one way or the other, and Kamui stands there, blankly for a moment, because washing away the memories would be like erasing sin from his past.

**14\. Life**

New life is a gift. So when Tsukuyo is swearing her lips off of her mouth and she's gripping his hand so hard that Edo itself might crumble, Zenshi clenches his jaw and attempts to bear the pain with her because she is giving to him what no one else can.

Yugao is small and pale and beautiful and warm and theirs, only theirs, crying softly in the light of Yoshiwara.

**15\. Memory**

Kagura briefly recalls seeing Zenshi. Only briefly. It's the time of memory where people are faceless and voices swirl by vaguely. Sometimes it's the smell that triggers thought comprehension; sometimes it's the color. For Zenshi, it's the quiet way he slips in and out of room that makes her recall a long-haired boy that brought her mother medicine every day.

About the time Kamui left, he stopped coming by. By then, her mother had long since passed, but the boy still checked up on her every now and then. There was an interval where he'd gone to school, but the summers had him running errands. He worked at the clinic, she remembered.

So when he asks if the wedding should take place outside or inside, she gives her truest opinion and doesn't pull out the signature Kagura sarcasm because there is a small memory inside her that tells her she owes this boy something.

"Outside," Kagura says, nodding. "The Yato aren't meant to be confined."

She has her moments, and this is one of them.

Kagura returns to nose-picking and boyish snorting moments later, the sage wisdom beyond her years disappearing like mist in the wind.

**16\. Misery**

Jenhao has nothing to cause him misery but sometimes his heart tugs and he wonders what he is doing, where he is, and why he's there. He glances in the mirror and sees a kindhearted soul, but if he looks harder there is a man with a dark expression and a dark outfit to match, a demeanor incompatible with his true self, indoctrinated with the ways of sin and inerasable blackness.

But he dons his insouciant smile, the lax shrug of his shoulders loosening his stiff back as he begins his day.

Today he shall see the Lieutenant.

"No," Jenhao says aloud, as if to reprimand himself. "It's the Sec-Gen now."

He marches out as if to greet a king, but he is hardly surprised when he finds his friend facedown at his desk, right hand clasped around a pen, left hand reaching for an empty mug of tea. It's a familiar sight to Jenhao, and he is quite fond of it.

For all of his dignity, grace, and high standing, it is this kind boy's face that washes away misery the best.

**17\. Longing**

Lanhua sews a panel on her son's childhood parasol every week. She usually finishes on time, but certainly there are moments where she cannot bring herself to. The one she designs now resembles a stained glass window. She loves any glass art, and Zenshi had been fond of bringing home little blown glass sculptures for her.

She longs for those times, but he has gone far, far away.

So she sews a panel, one by one, about an hour every morning and an hour every night, spending the rest of her time in a bakery where her beloved employees do their best to fill the void.

**18\. Break**

Break times on the ship are cherished times of peace.

No, that must be a complete lie because whoever let Mei on double break is a complete idiot and should be thrown into the abyss that is space.

By twelve o'clock midday, she is leading a sing-along in the galley.

By mid-afternoon, bowls and chopsticks are being flung across rooms that aren't even designated eating spots.

By dusk — 1830 ship time — Zenshi has Mei pinned, his boot squashing her shoulder and the tip of his umbrella at his throat. She can easily grab him and flip him up and over, but she's too busy laughing to notice.

"Don't give me that look," she cackles, "I'm not drunk or anything. Just high on whatever it is Qiguai slipped in my drink."  
Zenshi simply tells her to consider herself lucky _no one is dead_.

**19\. Away**

"Go away!" Soyo-hime hollers. Her voice is muffled by a pillow and the door is locked. Her head maid is desperate to reach her side, but the princess adamantly shuts them all out.

There is a knock, again, but this time it's not from her door. The maids' voices have receded, but the knock continues. Soyo ventures from her curled up position on her lush bed to see what it could be. Certainly there is danger to opening one's window to the world, but she doesn't particularly care at the moment. In fact, she can't even clearly think about what her brother has done that has made her so mad, but it doesn't matter because the point is that she's upset, and that's it.

To her surprise, the boy from Yoshiwara is huddled on the roof ledge outside the small window. Soyo has a balcony, but Seita must've decided that it was more discreet to go for the little window across from the door.

"How on earth did you get here?!" is the first thing Soyo manages. Just the sight of the younger boy is amusing and bewildering enough to stop her tears momentarily.

Seita gestures for her to lean out. She does so, and is amazed to find that the Secretary-General of the biggest embassy is perched casually a ways down from where Seita teeters precariously. The balcony above them provides adequate shade, and thus the man's umbrella is left hanging loosely at his hip.

"I have a surprise," Seita whispers. He whips out an ice cream cone that is impossibly perfect despite the blazing summer heat.

"I'm more concerned about the fact that you're _up_ here!"

"Just take the ice cream."

She does. And when the maids return, calling for the princess to please come out of her room, Soyo isn't even there. She's skirting the roof of the palace, unseen by all until a pair of guards yelp from down below and begin to gather a crowd. When it's time for them to go, Zenshi scoops both Seita and the princess and floats down nimbly and safely, returning them to the ground.

"Thanks, Seita," Soyo-hime says before she is dragged away and poor Zenshi interrogated.

"It's nice to have fun sometimes," agrees Seita, smiling despite the fact that the Mimawarigumi is wrestling him into a car, and Imai Nobume is quietly threatening Zenshi with handcuffs.

**20\. Breathe**

She is underwater. A slip of air leaves her lungs and gurgles toward the surface like the last breath of life leaving her.

Tsukuyo wakes up with a sense of dread and death and darkness, her stomach heaving in her throat and her heart leaden with unseen fear. She has a fear of drowning, she supposes, but no one really knows.

She is frozen there, in her cot, lying stiff and straight because she needs a moment or two to return from her watery doom.

"Hey, 'kuyo," comes the sleepy murmur. He's not even coherent in his half-awake slur, but he's conscious enough to put an arm around her and pull her closer. "Just breathe, 'kay?"

His breath brushes her forehead after he turns to face her, and it pushes the little baby blonde hairs aside. Zenshi presses a soft kiss to her forehead. His lips touch the edge of the scar that runs horizontally above her eyebrow. Tsukuyo reaches for something to hold onto, but her hands only find his bare chest and shoulders, so instead she curls into herself like a kitten and lets him — just for now — wrap her safely in his arms.

"I'm not afraid," she blurts indignantly.

"I know." He sighs, a long exhale. "Just let me hold you, will you?"

She flushes pink, but he has yet to open his eyes and actually take a good look at her. He doesn't need to, after all.

* * *

**Notes: **

-_Had_ to end on a cute note.

-I'm rereading these and some of them are really funny (at least to me, haha... *sweat drop here*)

-Seita still has a crush on Soyo.

**References:**

-"Qiguai" means "strange/odd" in Chinese...hehehe

-WHO IS YUGAO'S BOYFRAND?!


	3. Three Ten

So originally, I uploaded all of these at once...but the site glitched and all I was left with was an html code for all of them!

Now it did it TWICE! This is annoying...

Okay, here we go. I swear to MADAO, if this glitches again...

**Disclaimer: Danbooru kami is MADAO's.**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: three ten :.**_

* * *

**21\. Joy**

"It's a pleasure to meet you," the boy says. He wears an overly baggy pink sweater with _JOY_ spelled across the front, and he's got black hair that's neatly tied up. He's the spitting image of his father, but wears a familiar crooked smile one can find on the face of Edo's greatest ramen shop owner.

"The pleasure is mine," Zenshi replies. He shakes hands with the boy, who is polite, cheerful, and kind. Sometimes he pulls a sarcasm card that could give Mei a run for her money, but otherwise he's just a witty ditz at heart.

He waits politely in the parlor, hands clasped behind his back. Yugao comes down in her usual outfit, but something about her makeup makes her look more defined than usual. Zenshi gives her a disapproving look, but she pretends not to see it because for once her father cannot stop her. At least, not now.

"Be safe," Tsukuyo calls from the back room.

"Sure, Ma." Yugao waves over her shoulder.

"I brought an umbrella," the boy announces, noticing that yet again Yugao has neglected to bring hers. "It was nice seeing you all."

The two traipse out into sunlit Yoshiwara, headed for the elevators, and Zenshi stares after them. He's about to turn to say something to his wife when she cuts him off with a remark that leaves him speechless:

"At least she didn't find him half-dead in a gutter."

**22\. Pocket**

Gintoki reaches into his pocket, pulls out a peppermint, and pops it into his mouth casually. He had been debating earlier with Zura over the merits of mints over caramels. For one, mints make your breath fresh. But caramels are so_ sweet_.

He's about to reach into his other pocket and pull out a caramel when he sees Zura's son — who is the spitting image of Zura as a little kid — walking with the devil queen's daughter, shyly hand in hand. Gintoki wonders briefly who sent Zura's boy to the depths of hell, and also wonders if Zura is even alive now.

Will anyone in the Katsura family be left alive?

Will Edo see another day?

Will the Yoshiwaran queen take over the world?

Gintoki concludes that the answers lay beyond human comprehension, and thus, to prepare for the apocalypse, he should not only eat the caramel and the mint, but he should buy a canister of both of them to stock up. No, two truckloads of each.

Good plan.

**23\. Misfortune**

Mei has the misfortune of having a talent for treading on thin ice. She has yet to fall — and is confident she won't — but nonetheless tremors constantly threaten to break the surface and pull her under.

The day she taunts Abuto about Princess Kada is the day she nearly dies.

It's not the first time she's been on death row, but it's certainly one of the scariest.

"I don't play that kind of game, my dear," Abuto snarls in her ear before leaving her there, two broken fingers, dislocated shoulder, bruised cheekbone, internal bleeding, and all. "Consider yourself lucky your nose is still on your pretty lil' face."

In the end, it's Tabs who scoops her up and drags her to the infirmary to be patched up by the old ship doctor. Then, she has to conduct a meeting with foreign diplomats, and it's the last thing she wants to do but _oh_, does duty call.

But then, Mei also has the misfortune to walk into the meeting room and come face to face with Zenshi, now Secretary-General of the ACA, who does everything but smile.

He's actually laughing, very much so, on the inside.

**24\. Gray**

Takasugi Shinsuke may be the leader of a radical Joui faction, but it doesn't necessarily mean he sees the world in strictly black and white. Many things are grayed out spaces of considerate wealth in regards to his ambitions and his desires, and those things are often more important than the black and white ones.

When his right-hand man stumbles across political boundaries where they had been attempting to draw away, Takasugi is unfazed. But when Matako makes an inter-ship call to her Harusame friend, Lieutenant Mei, and somehow the charges against Bansai are completely dropped by all the embassies, he smothers his mild amazement and debates asking the blonde markswoman if she investigated the follow-up on her plea's course of action.

Bansai comes home without a diplomatic scratch, and an inroad for opportunity opens itself up. It's unclear, and shaded in dark tones, but it's not pitch black.

He's not one for the "light at the end of the tunnel," but he settles within the maelstrom that is loathing and objective swirled into one, and waits for the moment where he can drag the entire planet in with him.

**25\. Fortitude**

Tsukuyo endures her pregnancy with admirable tolerance and great fortitude. It's four o'clock in the morning, she needs to do her daily rounds of Yoshiwara, but she _can't even get out of bed_.

Zenshi says it's good for her. So close to the due date, it's best she stop overworking herself. In fact, he has obstinately taken to barring the doorway to prevent her from leaving. Tsukuyo threatens to ram him with their baby — a terrifying thought — but never gets around to doing it. The Hyakka might as well be slobbering over her the way they anticipate the baby. There have only been two babies since Seita, and those are the babies that have stayed and grown up. The rest have been sold to fate, whether the mothers liked it or not.

So the fact that the great leader of the Hyakka, the Courtesan of Death, is having a baby herself is a radiant piece of news.

But right now, at four o'clock in the morning, when _she can't even get out of bed_, Tsukuyo curses her future daughter with all her might. She hisses Zenshi's name, but he pretends not to hear her. His breathing rhythm indicates that yes, he is awake, but he is in no way, shape, or form going to help her get up. In fact, the Yato man is perfectly content to let his very pregnant wife struggle the entire day just to get up.

Tsukuyo slaps his back. When he doesn't immediately turn, she drives her elbow into his shoulder blade.

_That should do it_, she sneers inwardly.

She's right. But she's also wrong.

Zenshi rolls around, but doesn't stop to face her. Suddenly he is hovering over her, arms braced on either side of her head, his hands gripping her wrists.

"No," he simply says. And then he just ups and leaves her, at four o'clock in the morning, when _she can't even get out of bed._

A string of unrepeatable expletives leave her mouth.

He tells her not to teach the baby bad words.

**26\. Lust**

Zenshi looks over the disaster that is the love drug in Yoshiwara. He perches a good distance from the chaos, on the old rooftop he often shares with Tsukuyo. As men and women alike are consumed by lust and uncontrollable infatuation, he keeps an eye of Tsukuyo. She flushes pink whenever Gintoki leans in towards her, but as Shinpachi and Kagura chase one another around the city, the silver-haired samurai congregates a mass club of honeys, and Tsukuyo becomes more and more flustered, Zenshi decides that eventually, the Aizen Kou will dissipate and everyone will simply cease romantic fire.

He does resolve, however, to skin Sakata Gintoki's hide if he truly violates Tsukuyo by the end of the day.

**27\. Circus**

A trickle of blood runs behind his left ear. Zenshi briefly touches the cut lining the side of his head. It had been callous of him to allow Mei to insult the young lord of Cieldom, but he hadn't expected such a violent repercussion. Squatting parallel to the stalls of four circus zebras, he quickly evaluates the position of the young lord's royal snipers.

There is a shot.

Zenshi deflects the bullet with his umbrella, hurrying from his spot. A chariot of tall, lavender horses staggers before him, their two unicorn horns glinting in the light. Immediately, Zenshi dispatches the driver with a quick blow to the head, and slashes the leather harnesses with a slim pocketknife. He mounts one of the horses and spurs it on, galloping swiftly out of the circus tent.

At some point, he must've scooped Tabs onto the animal's back — or Tabs had dropped from the sky — because they are riding in tandem, cantering quickly to the exit. Mei is nowhere to be found.

"I hate this country," Tabs mutters as said petty officer flies through a stack of barrels, covered in various hues of paint, screaming bloody murder and firing round after round from her Yato parasol.

"_Every_ time," Zenshi replies. "Every single time."

"I hate circuses!" Mei shrieks. She grabs her own purple unicorn and chases after them. "Damn you, Prince Suji!"

**28\. Pencil**

Mei jerks skittishly when someone pulls her hair and sniggers. She'd snoozed off in class, and expectedly, that brutish, idiot Shinra had to make a big deal of it.

"Don't touch me," she hisses, reining in her colorful vocabulary upon receiving a glare from the teacher, who put up tirelessly with their antics each day.

"Really, _Aina_," snorts the Shinra, "your hair is _so_ pretty, though."

They are seniors at Ocentisa, it's the last quarter, and there's nothing to hold back a few snarky Amanto boys from picking on the famous celebrity Aina's little sister. Except when a pencil flies across the room, newly sharpened, and promptly stabs the Shinra boy between the knuckles. He howls in pain and clutches his hand as blood spills across his desk. The pencil, quite maliciously embedded in his hand, is quickly torn out. A collective turning of heads occurs, and there, by the pencil sharpener, is none other than Zenshi.

Indifferently, Zenshi continues sharpening another pencil, saying nothing. The teacher glances from the Yato to the Shinra. He sighs and pauses his lesson.

"Please clean up," he requests softly.

The Shinra boy stands and throws the pencil back at Zenshi, but the tall, stoic Yato throws his second writing tool so precisely that it splits the other one in half. The entire class acquiesces to silence, and the Shinra boy lowers his hands.

"May I go to the nurse?"

**29\. Lurking **

Demons lurk in the dark at night, under the bed and in the closet, peering through the tall grasses and hiding in the trees. The cadence of the river's gurgle and the chiming cricket's calls are meager masks to the art of demon dance. They rustle behind her back and breathe on the nape of her neck when she isn't looking.

"Beautiful," he whispers in her ear. "Precious."

The voice ebbs just as she wrenches into consciousness, a stream of daylight falling sweetly across the cot. She is alone. Jiraia's low, grating voice still encumbers her mind, each word, each syllable, each breath echoing as if he is in the room.

"Tsukuyo-nee?" Seita has knocked three times, but she barely notices. His muffled voice is distant, effete and dim.

"She's probably sleeping," comes Hinowa's voice. "Leave her be."

But the door slides open, and a tall Yato man dressed in a casual yukata steps around Hinowa's wheelchair and enters the room. Briefly, he makes eye contact with the room's occupant before rummaging through a pile of clothes.

"I found it," he calls over his shoulder, procuring a dark blue scarf that Seita had been searching for. "Organize your things, Seita."

"I'm not in charge of laundry," pouts the child. He snatches the scarf and bounds down the hall, followed by Hinowa as closely as she can. The Yato man lingers, one step from the door.

"Ya gonna stay there f'rever?" Tsukuyo says.

"Maybe."

"I ain't getting' up any time soon."

"All right." He backtracks then, coming to touch her shoulder gently.

"Don't ya got places to go?"

"Nah." He sits, cross-legged, beside her. "Not now."

The light streaming through the window almost enervates her argument. Tsukuyo wants to ask him to leave because she is feeling all but social, but his presence is everything but demanding, and he has an unequaled radiance that banishes the dark. Demons lurk in the dark at night, and dead men whisper in her ear, but the one before her holds her hand and chases them away when she cannot bring herself to do so.

**30\. Foreign**

The entirety of the Harusame ship is foreign to him. When he meets the intimidating, dark-haired graduate of Ocentisa, he isn't sure if his life is in peril or if he's made a new friend. Zhuyi likes to think positive, so he embraces the latter idea. He soon finds that his fearsome "friend" is a force to be reckoned with because he and the higher officer are throwing kicks and punches like there is no tomorrow.

"What did you say your name was?" he stutters at lunch.

"Zenshi. Zhuyi, right?"

"Yes." He is out of place, dressed in a poor man's shirt and patched slacks that only reach mid-calf. "Where are you from?"

Zenshi passes a gentle rebuke. "From somewhere. And yourself?"

"From a farm. Somewhere." Zhuyi offers a snarky yet shy smile.

"Well, it looks like we have something in common. Somewhere."

The ship still feels too big for him, but at least someone is a little less foreign and a little closer to home.

* * *

**Notes:**

-The Gintoki one cracks me up!

-Zhuyi = Tabs (see **Eyes of Wolves**!)

-Guess who waived Bansai's misdemeanors?

**References:**

-The lord of _Ciel_dom? Kuroshit_Suji_?!

-Pregnant Tsukuyo unable to get up? My mom's story 100% lol.

-The Aizen Kou arc: since it's unfinished as of yet, we'll see what happens...I was planning on writing a short story on it.

-The circus one partially inspired by the soon-to-be-aired Kuroshitsuji special... :D

**Author: **I've uploaded this so many times! This is frustrating... fanfiction website why you do this?!


	4. Four Ten

Okay this will the be the second time I upload this chapter...hope it works now! I've found a way that doesn't tend to glitch (fingers crossed!)

**Disclaimer: in the end, we are all MADAO**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: four ten :.**_

* * *

**31\. Crib**

The moment the robber picks the lock, Zenshi is up. Without disturbing Tsukuyo, who has had a most tiring day, he slips out of the room and shades toward the intruder. He hears nimble, soft footsteps edging toward Yugao's room. A flicker of light off a blade, and suddenly Zenshi is lunging after the man because it's not a robber it's a hired hitman.

He never manages to catch the man. Instead, Yugao thrashes in her crib, hoarse cries like a kitten's rising from her throat. The knife spills across the floor, sliding across the tatami mats. The intruder is pinned to the ground, a set of glinting teeth at his throat.

It is then that Zenshi truly appreciates saving the irritating little alien wolf pup one year prior. With brilliantly glistening blue-black fur and a stripe of vicious white down his chest, Lang, who is larger than most of Earth's canines, looms with intimidation. His fangs poise at ready around the man's jugular.

He is the protector.

**32\. Miss**

"I don't miss him." Tsukuyo folds her arms. "I don't."

Hinowa, who is darning socks, bats her eyelashes.

"You don't?"

"I don't."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure." But Tsukuyo's cheeks flush slightly pink, and Hinowa knows she's won.

"You miss him."

"I don't! I don't miss'im at all."

"You don't miss me?"

Tsukuyo whips around, finding herself face to face with Zenshi. A gargled shriek comes inadvertently from her lips and she throws her arms around him. A split second later, the blonde courtesan scrambles to push him away and frown.

"I didn't miss ya."

"Was that a little girl squeal?" Zenshi asks.

"No."

Hinowa rolls her eyes. "Just admit it, Tsukki, you missed him."

"I did _not_."

"I got that on tape!" exclaims Seita. The boy then proceeds to run for his life.

**33\. Tree**

There is one tree on their end of the campus — an ancient oak that towers over the courtyard between dorms. There is plenty of room for gorilla Amanto to climb up into its lengthy, sturdy branches and have tea parties and banquets. There is a clique of bird-like alien girls that often perch on the topmost branches and gossip their afternoons away. The base of the tree's trunk is so wide, one can walk a good minute without ever seeing the other side.

Zenshi escapes the balmy mid-spring semester within those branches. Sitting at the base is too exposed; instead, he finds footholds in the rock-like bark and swings up to where a few gorilla are slurping drinks. At the sight of the young Yato, they immediately hoot and crash into higher canopies.

"What a socialite," Mei chimes from beneath him.

He throws a book.

**34\. Abandoned**

It's just a dream. Abandoned on a planet where he has no ties, no memories, no points in time. But he's never had a real place to belong. His time is not a line, but a dimension with many parallels and layers and levels. He cannot kill the little boy whose knees quake because it reminds him too much of his daughter.

He cannot bleed to death because he is already dead.

Delong stares forlornly at his hands, clean, pale, unstained.

He meanders until the Lieutenant clasps his shoulder gently and tells him that his wife and daughter would like to say hello.

A lot has changed in this abandoned timeline of his.

Yes, quite a lot.

**35\. 4:29 A.M.**

Mei hates waking up before her alarm. She also hates staring at the clock when she can't sleep. The clock reads 4:27.

She attempts to roll onto her back, but every muscle in her body aches and blames the paralyzing blow of the man in the cloak. He'd swept out of nowhere, from the depths of Yoshiwara's streets, and parried her every move like he'd known them for seven years.

And he had.

Mei decides she hates Zenshi when the clock reads 4:28. Her blithe, merry acceptance of her new rank dissolves into bitterness, a barbaric self-exile that places roiling frustration in her gut. She hates him.

The soft glow of the digital timekeeper is adamant but unconcerned. Just like him. She hates him.

"Lighten up," he would chide. "I'm not holding my breath for you."

It's 4:29 A.M. She can't be sure she hates him, still.

**36\. Guns**

Matako is not there to cover her back. The Kiheitai shrinks into nothingness the moment she enters the room, and suddenly she's very alone in the capacious space. The camaraderie between herself and the Kiheitai's top marksman leaves Mei callously exposed, vulnerable.

"Welcome."

Four gunmen train their weapons on her. Four swordsmen fill in the spaces where she could duck out. She is expected to kneel, but of course, Mei does not. She has never yielded authority, not even to the galaxy's greatest.

She would not kneel for the leader of the Hitotsubashi faction.

But she will admit that his slicked back hair, patterned cravat, and extravagant jacket are more than just for show. His eyes are cold and dismissive. He is a man of power, of evincing royalty.

"Hitotsubashi Nobu Nobu."

He smiles.

**37\. Sacrificial**

Everything is sacrificial.

Ungyou's life.

Delong's life.

Jenhao's presence.

Zenshi's loyalty.

His sister's love.

But he has yet to gain anything in return for all these things lost, and all he can do is stare out the window of his leaky little ship and recall the times when they smiled.

**38\. Snow**

Mutsu does not believe in love stories. Nor does she believe she is capable of participating in one, for she is a stark, cold character and the day she falls in love will be the day Katsura Kotaro has common sense.

Yet there is something warm and tingly that passes through her when she spots them: Zenshi, wrapped in a scarf she sent him last year, in stride with dumb ole Tatsuma, who is fabulously spiffy in a new navy pea coat.

"It's not cold," is the first thing Mutsu says.

Zenshi casts a glance upward, and Tatsuma laughs his donkey braying laugh.

"Whaddaya mean, Mutsu? It's snowing! How aren't you cold? Your cheeks are red!"

Her fist finds his face and leaves a nice black eye, a fine contrast to the thin layer of frost in the grass.

**39\. Balk**

Sarutobi Ayami is one hundred percent kunoichi.

She is also one hundred percent stalker, fan girl, and passionate lover (in a unilateral relationship, that is).

When it comes to her work, however, she can become anything. She does not balk at the most dangerous of requests, even ones that are borderline suicidal. Bakufu, Joui, name it and she does it. For a whopping fee, of course.

Her newest assignment whisks her to one of the many Amanto embassies in the great city of Edo. This building — the layout of which she has carefully memorized — has ornate, pearly gates and a large, Greek Pantheon-style forefront. She takes a glance at her target, nods as if to affirm her mission, and proceeds with utmost caution. Her goal is to slip in, slip out, and make the assassination as quick and painless as possible.

Glibly, Sacchan momentarily lets her mind wander to how much she shall enjoy hiding in Gin-san's closet for the rest of the day after this assignment.

Someone taps her shoulder.

"Can I help you?"

Sacchan wheels around, startled. She hasn't even moved past the gate along her secretive route by the hedges, and here is a man in a suit, looking somewhat peeved but mostly disinterested in her ventures. It's time for a guise.

"O-Oh dear," she exclaims far too loudly. "Yes, certainly! I was looking for the—"

She freezes midsentence because the face she looks up into now is horribly familiar. In fact, if she just glances down, she can find _that exact face on her target photo._

"The Secretary-General? You'd be looking at him." The man straightens, and he is quite tall. He looms before her and looks stunningly intimidating. Sacchan struggles to close her gaping mouth and rearrange her verbal skills. The man continues, "I suggest you inform your client that his request is impossible. Especially seeing as you haven't gotten past our front gates."

"I—"

"Sarutobi?"

Sacchan whirls around again, this time to see a familiar blonde courtesan trailing their way.

"Tsukki?"

"What are ya doin' here?" asks Tsukuyo.

"I, well, um," stutters Sacchan, stuffing the photo of the Sec-Gen into a belt. "Nothing."

Dressed in all black in broad daylight, three knives and a vial of purple poison blatantly visible on her belt, Sacchan spells both assassination and moron all at once. The make things worse, the photo that she tries to hide flutters to the ground.

"Nothin', huh?"

"Yep. Nothing."

Needless to say, Sarutobi Ayame makes a run for it.

**40\. Heal**

Zenshi has seen fingers reattached, spilled guts pushed back in, prosthetics made to replace lost limbs. But the sight of a man that walks in his missing half his body, on the verge of going up into the heavens right then and there, somehow still making it into the clinic, freezes him to the spot.

Zenshi is ten years old. He cannot honestly say he is frightened when the man grips him by the shoulder with one hand and croaks, "Kid, get me a doc," but he cannot say he is completely calm, either.

Almost immediately, nurses and staff seize the man and drag him to the nearest intensive care unit. Zenshi watches them go. One year ago, he had found himself in that room, wondering if he'd ever again see out of his right eye.

"Zenshi."

He turns; it's his aunt.

"Go and see if your mother needs any help at home."

"I'd like to stay." He's so excruciating polite that she purses her lips and hesitates.

"All right. Only if you stay out of the way." They're useless words because he is but a shadow, gliding seamlessly behind her as she makes her way to the operating room.

He watches intently to learn, but he is an ersatz diamond compared to her genuine skill.

She heals. He can only imitate.

* * *

**Notes:**

-"_Abandoned_" is from the point of view of Delong and can be connected to **EoW**'s last chapter.

-"_4:20 AM_" can also be connected to **EoW**

-Whose perspective is "_Sacrificial_" from?

-Sacchan is hilarious.

**References:**

-_Lang_ literally just means "wolf" in Chinese. [I'm so original aren't I. I've named people "freedom freedom" in two different languages.]

**Pairings:**

-SAKAMUTSU. Yes.

-Mei x ...? (it's a real bizarre one...and it doesn't work out for them in the end...)


	5. Five Ten

A whole ton of chapters, here we go!

**Pairings:**

-It's Mei x Nobu Nobu. WEIRD RIGHT?

**Disclaimer: JOUI GA JOY.**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: five ten :.**_

* * *

**41\. Cold**

Mei has ten thousand sweaters on, yet she is still colder than the icebox down in the morgue. She is wearing coats and jackets and scarves borrowed from every single crewman on this end of the ship, yet for some reason she continues to shiver like there is no tomorrow. Her teeth clack incessantly and she is a walking, freezing fanfare.

Kamui is visibly amused when she sits down in the conference room, several sizes thicker, her teeth knocking away like a desperate woodpecker. He hands out a map he would like them all to study, but Mei is duly estranged from the conversation. It's just so _cold_, so very, _very _cold.

Mei refuses, after the meeting, to go see the Dr. Steth, the ship doctor. Instead, she holes up in Jinlin's room because Jinlin is nondescript, quiet, and passive. Though the older woman prompts Mei to get checked up, she doesn't push too hard.

That is, until her cousin knocks at the door.

"Hey Bev, get the frozen tigress out here."

Delong's voice is an eternal growl, as if he can't get half a frog out of his throat. Ultimately, he is a kind man, but he outstrips most of the crew in intimidation rankings. So, looming outside of Jinlin's room like a snarling dragon, there is little Mei can do but let him call seniority on this one.

"You caught the Jitterbug," he says as soon as she relents.

"The _what_?" Mei snorts through a congested nose and heavy lungs. It's freezing and now she can't even breathe.

"Planet Jitterbug. You caught the jitters, you idiot."

"I hate space."

"Right." He has her stiffly by the arm. Delong unceremoniously dumps her in the deck one infirmary. "Patch'er up, Steth."

"That's _Doctor_ Steth, to you," hums the older Yato, ushering Mei onto an examination table. "And mind yourself, the regular flu's going around."

"Yeah." Delong waves over his shoulder. "Tigress, the crew wants their sweaters back."

Mei glares at his back.

She won't return any of them.

**42\. Drink**

"I think you've had enough," Zenshi informs her rather forcefully, for the third time now. He grasps the bottle of Dom Pérignon and tugs it away from her lips. Immediately, Tsukuyo becomes violent, hugging the glass with a pressing need to continue her lovely night out.

"I will _hurt_ _you_," she enunciates, hoping to shake off her drunken slurs.

"Tsukuyo, I will hurt _you_," Zenshi replies coldly, "if you do not let go of this drink."

"Watch out down low, buddy," she snorts, flushing even redder than she already is, "don't say I didn't warn ya."

She clumsily tackles him; he dodges and lets her slam face first into the wall. He does not pity her.

"Ya shouldn't be drinkin' up here," she suddenly hoots, slinging her arms around his waist upon regaining her balance. Typically, Tsukuyo probably would have been enraged at being fooled into crashing, but she is so inebriated that all she wants is her drink and probably his pants. "Yer gonna spill all over the bed. Yer gonna fall in yer bed and spill it all."

"I won't." Out of extensive experience, Zenshi has learned the intricate dance of avoiding Tsukuyo's intoxicated administrations. He backs up, forcing her to drop her arms from his sides, and stuffs the cork back into the bottle. The Dom Pérignon is placed gingerly outside their door, which he slides shut rapidly when Tsukuyo scrambles for it.

"Gimme!" she whines, a childlike pout on her lips.

"Tsukuyo." He grasps her upper arms as she curls away from him and attempt to duck out the door. Zenshi swears he will skin the hide of the perpetrator of this crime. Whoever thought it was a great idea to share alcohol with Tsukuyo would find their days limited starting after this night.

Tsukuyo, however, is both elated and frustrated. She has two drunken moods: the first is a nonsensical, almost comical type of violent, and the other is loopy beyond any sort of cognitive limit. Sometimes — such as now — she is both at once. Zenshi sometimes wonders how her inhibitions disintegrate so completely. Even drunk, most people have some semblance of their original selves. And here is Tsukuyo, but she's not exactly the Courtesan of Death — she's more of a clown, now.

She bumps into him forcefully enough to make him stagger backwards.

"Yer gonna get it now," she mutters. The blonde grabs his belt and tugs, undoing the buckle and sliding her thumbs into the waistband of his slacks. Inwardly, Tsukuyo is ecstatic because had he been wearing that standard Yato outfit of his, she might've had a harder time pulling his clothes off. But he's in black slacks and a white dress shirt and tie. She adores that tie. "What a shame," she whispers to herself, knowing full well that he reads her intentions like a book.

"You're getting nowhere," he tells her flatly. "Nowhere at all."

"Oh, I'm gettin' there," she snorts, giggling between hiccups. Tsukuyo undoes his tie with surprising agility, slinging it over her own shoulder as she continues on her unbuttoning journey.

He waits a few seconds, sighing when she momentarily forgets what she is doing and just stares at his chest, and then takes her by the shoulders.

"Okay, Tsukuyo," he says docilely, "let's go to bed."

But his actions are hardly kind at all. Zenshi unceremoniously dumps her on the cot, rolls her up in a tube of blankets, and waits through her complaints and yowls and screeches.

"Good night," he says cheerily, tugging his tie out from the Tsukuyo spring roll.

"I hate you."

"I know."

**43\. Advertisement**

"Get your _Yato Umbrella _today! Just—"

"Shut that _off_," groans Abuto. Mei throws the remote and tells him to shut it off himself. "That was a waste of energy," he growls, rolling his eyes and changing the channel instead. An Earthling weather station pops on, the forecaster poising elegantly in front of a panel of daily conditions.

"What an awful advertisement," notes Tabs. "Which planet was that from?"

"Earth, of course," laughs Mei. "Who else would do that kind of thing?"

"Buy one get one free," chimes Abuto, rolling his eyes. He pauses. "Aren't you two on duty?"

"Aren't you?" they reply.

**44\. Whale**

"Dolphin."

"Space whale."

"Shark."

"_Dolphin_."

"Space whale."

"Shark!"

Mei glowers. "It's definitely a dolphin, not a shark. See how its tail moves up and down and not side to side?"

"There is no up and down," argues Tabs, "for all you know it could be a shark swimming sideways from our perspective!"

"Valid point," Zenshi says. "But it's a space whale."

"It's a freaking dolphin," hisses Mei.

Zenshi shrugs. "Space whale."

"Shark!" cries Tabs. He even goes for his intercom microphone, as if to ask the entire crew if they think the silvery, wiggling creature out on the starboard side is a shark, a space whale, or a dolphin.

No contest. It's a space whale.

**45\. Tease**

"Why do you carry an umbrella when it's not raining? Freak!"

"Vampire!"

"Nutjob!"

Yugao nearly blows all three boys to smithereens. No one teases the daughter of the Secretary General and the Courtesan of Death.

**46\. Stamp**

If Kougi has to stamp one more piece of mail because the post office girl is sick, she will hurl the ink pad across the room, nail the Secretary General in the head, and go to jail for life. Almost as if reading her thoughts, Zenshi turns around and warns her not to fling objects at him in her frustration.

"I will track down that girl and _make_ her come to work."

"I'm sure. Would you like an address?" he holds out a slip of paper. She snatches it in her paws and harrumphs.

"Yes, yes I would."

**47\. Stiletto**

Mei kills five men with her shoes. Undoubtedly, the prestigious party accompanying her is truly awed.

"I'm impressed." Hitotsubashi Nobu Nobu does not simply dish out compliments, but this time around, the Yato woman's ferociousness is worthy of praise.

She turns sharply on him, wielding her stilettos. Inwardly, she wants to murder everyone there. If Zenshi had not been a moronic traitor, _he_ would be the one negotiating, and _he_ would not run into these troubles. For one, all the men would have been killed instantly and with less of a bloody mess. And secondly, the Hitotsubashi faction would never dare to toy with a man like him.

Yet here she was, a woman and a target of the men's sniggers and doubts and haughty attitudes.

So she kills five men with her shoes to prove a point.

Earlier, _Nobu-dono_ — as she so gladly addressed him — had seized her by the throat. Mei never flinched, not once.

"I hope you don't make a habit out of choking people to greet them," she had said. And now, he returns the favor in all his glory, slicked hair and patterned cravat and all.

"I hope you don't make a habit out of killing men in cold blood with expensive Jimmy Choos."

"Would you like to die by fashion designer heels? Because I can arrange that." Mei casts him a slightly deranged grin, clasping the bloodied footwear to the breast.

Very wisely, the fearsome leader of the Hitotsubashi faction closes his mouth and doesn't utter a word.

**48\. Trace**

Zenshi absently traces the line of Tsukuyo's bare shoulder blade with his fingers. She immediately freezes up, skin prickling at his soft touch.

"What're ya doin'?"

"You're awake?"

"Of course I am," she snaps, rolling around to face him. She is careful to keep a thin comforter wrapped around her torso, inching away from his hands.

"Mmhmm." Zenshi isn't really paying attention, though.

He continues tracing lines on her skin, swirl by swirl, from shoulder to chin to lips.

"Are ya even listenin' to me?"

"Nah."

**49\. Triangle**

"There is no such thing as a Bermuda Triangle in Space," Mei declares adamantly.

"Then where _are_ we?" Tabs points out the window, and indeed, they are being sucked into a triangle-shaped hole of doom. "_What is going on?!_"

"There is no such thing as—"

Mei is abruptly cut off.

Because she wakes up and half the crew is staring her in the face, yelling, "Lieutenant are you all right?!"

At first she is touched by their concern. And then she realizes that they're all just here for their coats and sweaters and scarves.

She vows never again to catch the Jitterbug.

**50\. Drown**

If she sinks to the bottom of the ocean, she'll never see him again.

If she doesn't swim to the surface, she'll drown.

If she falls, she'll never return.

But his hand grasps hers and suddenly her entire body is flooded with warmth. She crashes onto the shore with the coming of high tide. Her sand-colored hair sticks slickly to her cheeks and there is salt in her eyes and ears but she doesn't care because he will never let go of her, any part of her. He is hers, one hundred percent hers, blue eyes and black hair and all, and he will never let her drown again.

* * *

**Notes:**

-The Jitterbug dance seems fun. *laughs loudly*

-Can you tell I have fun with intoxicated Tsukki?

-It's always a space whale. Just like there is an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and not Earth and Mars.

-"_Tease_" is really short because...Yugao just beats them up and leaves. The end.

**References:**

-As mentioned in **EoW**, Jinlin/Jenhao/Delong are all just altered names of my relatives (ohoho because I'm so inspired *rolls eyes*). Jinlin/Jenhao are irl siblings, Delong is our uncle. (names changed, of course)

**Pairings:**

-Have I mentioned that this whole story is about Zenshi and Tsukuyo? No. Well then.

-SEE? It's NOBU NOBU. He's surprisingly good-looking, okay? (-_-)


	6. Six Ten

These themes get quite difficult at times. But they're really fun! I do tend to write fast, however...

** I had this crazy dream where Kamui and Kagura were Crown Prince and Princess of the Yato planet. Weiiird. There was a terrible terrorist attack and they really want to leave the palace, but they can't because it's heavily guarded...? **

**Disclaimer: Strawberry milkyyyy?!**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: six ten :.**_

* * *

**51\. Wedding**

Because Kagura's word is law and the Yato truly cannot be confined, the wedding takes place outside and is a complete mess of half chaos and half order. The Yorozuya attend because — of course — there is free food. Half the Harusame's 7th Division crewmen are in disguises (also known as suits and an army of umbrellas). The Katsura faction is present because Ikumatsu is part of the catering squad. A little gathering of Ocentisa classmates make themselves known among the crowd because Kougi has recruited them. An entire fleet of famous people (famous people, aliens, creatures?) are on the party list because Mei is invited, and because Mei is invited, that celebrity sister of hers is invited, and because that celebrity sister of hers is invited, everyone from Prince Hata of the North Star to some old guy named MADAO is there.

Head of the catering squad is none other than Lanhua, Zenshi's mother, who very much enjoys Ikumatsu's ramen and considers sponsoring the Earthling's shop.

Organizing the entire thing are Linter and Hinowa, but at the same time it's not Linter and Hinowa because actually the former's endless resources have taken over and now it's a melee. He and Hinowa are the overseers, though the massive crowd is hard to see over _literally_.

Eventually they cut the crowd to a select audience; the party can come later. All while Tsukuyo complains about her itchy dress, comes down the aisle alone — Gintoki does toss a rubber spider, receiving five kunai in return — and bears with the fact that _this ain't over yet_.

"Way to go, chickie," hoots Mei upon the ending of the wedding ceremony. "You're stuck with him for life!"

Someone smacks Mei upside the head. It's probably Abuto.

And then the question arises: _Why is Abuto here_?

**52\. Proposal**

If Tsukuyo knew that accepting that stupid ring would grant her _that wedding_, she probably would…_not_ have declined, anyway. Inwardly, she enjoys these kind of things, but she doesn't tell, of course.

So when he gets down on one knee and proposes in all his modern, western-style glory — full suit and tie and everything — she is too flustered and pink in the face to say no.

And then the quiet room explodes because the entirety of Yoshiwara must be in there, anticipating the moment the leader of the Hyakka says "Yes".

**53\. Stitch**

His life is a stitched up menagerie of people, memories, and places. Sometimes he recalls the feeling of pulled skin; his aunt runs the sutures through numbed eye tissue, but he still fails to see a thing out of that right side. Or he meanders through a kitchen once large to him, catching a glimpse of his childhood umbrella, more than two thousand five hundred fifty-seven days embroidered on the panels. He cannot imagine how each second of each day of seven years can remain so poignantly memorized on a simple parasol's canvas.

Yet here he is, in one piece, stitched together by many people, but hardly ever by himself.

**54\. Dragon**

Delong relegates tasks to his underlings like no one else can. Unlike Zenshi, who prefers to complete tasks by his own hand, Delong will hand off assignments like homework to all the nasty students.

"You've got to be kidding me," Mei says.

"Nope."

Mei considers stabbing the man in the back, right through the eye of the blue dragon on the shoulder of his _changshan_.

"Don't even think about it, tigress. I'll throw you into space."

**55\. Elf**

Limona is not an elf. At least, that's what she tells herself. She has elegantly pointed ears and a short stature that rebuff her claim, but it hinders her not in her quest for personal salvation. She is an Amanto from a planet not far from Sciuttla; her country is one that is awfully successful in toy manufacturing, a fact that makes life on Earth slightly miserable because she is apparently "Santa's Elf" to most.

She is currently the proud young manager of the ACA Embassy's mail department. In the biggest Amanto office through all of Edo, the manager of mail is a big deal. Or so she tells herself.

So when the head secretary calls in sick and she is miraculously summoned to replace that position for a few days, Limona is straight up terrified from the tips of her little antennae to her tippy-tiptoes. She has handled mail from all the important people addressed to the most important person, but she has never actually _met_ that important person.

This person is her boss.

No, he's her boss's manager's boss's boss.

Limona doesn't wish to appear an unsophisticated desk-working brute (however strange that may sound) so she dresses her best and presents herself to her boss's manager's boss's boss with as much of a dignified, professional air as she can.

A call-boy introduces her with such a casual tone that Limona wants to shriek and shake his head off his shoulders. But nothing much really happens aside from her heart nearly stopping in anxious terror.

"You can sit, you know," the call-boy whispers in her ear. She sits in the secretary's desk, wholly uncomfortable for two reasons: one, because the office is grand beyond comparison, and two, because the man in charge has yet to say much to her, granted he already said hello.

Observation tells her that he is actually not much older than her. He keeps the call-boy in the room — the cheetah Amanto often just staples papers and makes stacks for him — and doesn't request a whole lot. It's as if Limona was assigned just to sit there.

"Limona, was it?"

She nearly leaps out of her lavender skin.

"Yes, sir?"

There is a strangely amused half-smile on his face. She reminds herself not to forget that though they are approximately the same age, he is a Yato, a fierce warrior, and the most powerful person on this side of Edo. No, on this side of the solar system. No, on this side of—

"Where did you go to school?"

The question catches her off guard.

"Um. Ocentisa, sir."

He smiles.

"Period 9, Comparative Political Systems, with Mr. Paoborin? I sat right in front of you."

Suddenly she saw it. The same dark hair, but a face she never quite saw because he never turned around and only passed back papers because Mr. Paoborin distributed them by seated columns. It was an auditorium-like classroom, each row of desks one level higher than the last. A head of dark hair, but hardly ever a glimpse of his face. And that was mostly because his row was a row of Yato students, never quite called by name because they intimidated even the teacher, and Limona had quickly made a beeline for the door every time the bell rang.

"We're the same age?" is all she manages to squeak.

"No. I graduated a year earlier."

"You're the one who stabbed Admun with a pencil."

Zenshi chuckles, sliding a stack of papers towards the call-boy.

"That would be me."

For the rest of the day, Limona can't help but stare, wondering how a neat diplomat's son from the Yato planet became the man before her, in full suit and tie, clashing with his cropped hair and scars and earrings.

And then she sits in awe because the next two people that walk in are horribly familiar now that she thinks about it. The proper secretary, who looks sick as a dog — though she literally is one — and needs to pick up a document, is the Inuisei from two rows down. And the space pirate lady that marches in with her?

The one who laughed when Admun was stabbed with a pencil.

**56\. Flag**

The last thing you want to do in Capture the Flag is let Zenshi become your strategist. Needless to say, his team wins every time, to the point where he is banned from even participating in the game, and instead he designs the field and the rules. This round of Capture the Flag features target leaders, who are basically player equivalents of the flag. Should one team take out the other's marked target, the game is over. Typically, the flag simply accompanies the aforementioned target, but there are times when teams choose to separate the two and hope for a successful two-front war.

When Zenshi sets the field as the school's three gyms, three pools, and the recreational center, Mei inwardly cheers.

Until she's set as the target, and all she does the whole game is run.

The game ends when Mei, with her team's flag wrapped around her torso like a toga, is dragged into a swim lane and gargles chlorine mixed with a bitter loss.

Of course, the other team is led by fellow Yato and public enemy number one, Rokudo, who just laughs and tosses her soaking flag back in her face.

"Can we ban him, too?"

"Nah." Zenshi offers her a towel.

"Please tell me that you'll get back at him by graduation," she snarls. Mei, at this point in time, had bright orange hair that falls to her waist, and is all but pleased at the dunk in the pool. For a moment, she threatens to smack him because it looks like he'll decline, but to her surprise, he smiles.

"Plus interest," Zenshi says, rising from his crouch by her side. She's hanging at the edge of the pool, sopping wet.

"Plus interest," she echoes grumpily. "Better be good."

Mei doesn't receive said interest for years and years. But it does put a smile on her face when Rokudo walks into the room and he's suddenly surrounded by Harusame space pirates.

**57\. Robot**

Tama is the do-all robot. If no one else can fix it, she can. Though if even Gengai can't fix it, then she'll shake her head in that choppy, mechanical way of hers, tell you it's a lost cause, and promptly bill you a hefty fee for wasting her time.

So when Tabs and his beloved tablet have a falling out — he can't accept the fact that its smooth screen simply won't light up again — it's up to Tama to rescue their relationship.

The scene ends with Mei and Zenshi looking particularly dubious when Tama tells Tabs she appreciates the fine relationship he has with his dear tablet. No one in the room questions it, but there is a sense of impending doom in the way Tama's robotic eyes light up when Tabs details how he has taken such good care of his touch screen tablet.

**58\. Orange**

"Should I really be seen talking to you?" Aina asks.

"Why is that a problem?" counters Mei defensively, folding her arms in the exact mirror of her older sister. If only Mei had kept that gloriously long, tangerine orange hair of her, she would have matched her sister inch by glaring inch. But she finds it best to make her opinion known, and that is why her once waist-length hair is cropped close to her skull and dyed so blonde it's nearly white.

"You're a pirate, Mei. Sister or not, I can't be seen having negative affiliations." Aina is clad in a top designer dress and strappy four-inch heels, her hair swept up in a professional updo and gold earrings dangling from her earlobes. Her expressions are easily readable, but Mei has mastered the art of inscrutability. It's a little tidbit she picked up from her predecessor in this position.

"Why are you even here?" asks Mei.

"I should ask you that."

"I'm accompanying an important person on an assignment, thank you very much."

"In that outfit?" Leave it to Aina to pick at the pointless.

"Of course." Mei forgets that her hostile older sibling has a propensity for picking at fashion. She won't let it interfere, though.

"Where's that man of yours? Linter's son."

Mei bristles. "First of all, he's not my man, and furthermore, he's defected from the Harusame."

Aina rolls her eyes.

"Then who are you here with?"

Mei jerks her thumb out into the grand hall. They are hidden by the shadows of the narrow corridor, unseen by the rest of the party attendees. Aina follows her sister's directions, peering out into the crowd. The younger sister expects the older to comment wryly on the choice of accompaniment, but instead what comes out is a subject that even Kamui would be adverse to mentioning.

"You sure do like your men that way, don't you?"

"What?"

"You know what I mean. Tall, undercuts, government-affiliated, prominent. Don't lie." Aina's grin is sadistically delighted.

Mei turns on her heel and stomps back into the party. The stormy expression plastered on her face tells Nobu Nobu not to say a thing.

Across the room, Zenshi studies the ball with something akin to distaste. It must be Tsukuyo's discomfort rubbing off on him. They are in space, after all.

**59\. Burn**

Hinowa's chair is not friendly with gravel, uneven terrain, and the unpaved world in general. Thus, it is Zenshi's noble duty to attend to the garden when the beautiful sun of Yoshiwara is feeling under the weather or simply too fatigued to crawl out of her wheelchair and scuff her knees in the yard. While it may not be much of a yard — a row of flowers in the front and a little courtyard in the back of the shop — the sun is absolutely blistering above them.

It's certainly too hot to wear that dark uniform in this horrid heat. It's also too hot even for that navy yukata Hinowa bought for him. In fact, Zenshi decides that it's so hot he doesn't even care that half of the Yoshiwaran women are ogling him — they don't dare touch something of Tsukuyo's, of course — and ends up shirtless in Hinowa's humble garden. He looks ridiculous, like he belongs on a luxury yacht somewhere with his casual khaki shorts and dark boat shoes. Whoever bought him the outfit knew exactly where they wanted to place him. That someone, admittedly, is Hinowa, but anything from Hinowa is acceptable.

So in all his yachting glory, Zenshi kneels outside and snips at dead rose bushes, tenders the budding tulips, and waters everything evenly. Yoshiwara isn't busy at the moment, but the night workers enjoying their daytime rest before sunset have a lovely time watching him from the shop across the street.

Zenshi is mildly uncomfortable, but shakes it off as heat irritation and sweat. That is, until someone comes over with a generous shade and suddenly his the burning on his shoulders abates. He glances up.

"What're ya doin'?"

"Gardening."

"I can see that." The look of disapproval on Tsukuyo's face is apparent, but Zenshi can only think of one thing to say.

"How are you wearing that?" Indeed, he gestures to the typical black kimono patterned with leaves she has on.

"Are ya tellin' me to take it off?"

"Maybe." Zenshi wipes sweat from his brow. Tsukuyo has hoisted his Yato umbrella over his head; he remains crouched by that silly row of tulips.

"Yer gonna burn right up in this sun," she informs him with a frown. "How'd ya forget yer umbrella? Did sunscreen ever cross yer mind?"

"Sunscreen," he parrots, owlishly.

"Yes."

"No." He sheds the thick gardener's gloves and stands, taking the umbrella from Tsukuyo.

"Yer back is gonna blister real bad."

"All right."

Tsukuyo's right eye twitches, and before Zenshi has enough time to break for the shop entrance, she slaps his back. Hard. Surely enough, her hand leaves a scorching impact painful enough to make him grimace, sucking air sharply through gritted teeth.

"I told ya. Now get inside. The garden can wait." Declaring him to be the stupidest Yato on Earth — what kind of Yato gardens in the sun without an umbrella? — she pushes him inside and tells him he's lucky he didn't disintegrate like Hosen did. Later, Hinowa will tell him he's lucky Tsukuyo didn't drown him with aloe and other skin remedies.

Zenshi makes a point never to forget his umbrella again.

**60\. Pirate**

Yugao is three years old. At three, she enjoys pretending to be a space pirate because Auntie Mei is all for it. She loves family reunion parties because she can be anything she likes. Whether it's a pirate, a princess, or a police officer, Yugao decides what she becomes.

When she's five years old, her Ma hands her a kunai and she learns to hit a target with accidental grace. She practically flings it backwards and takes out Seita's eye, but that's no matter because she's hitting the target with ridiculous accuracy within a few months.

At seven, Yugao knows the entirety of Yoshiwara's rooftops and backstreets by heart. She can navigate from corner to corner, leaping from the top of one row of buildings to another. She often climbs up into the higher rungs of the palace, but is never aware of the fact that one parent or the other is always trailing her.

When she turns nine, Yugao's birthday party is nothing short of fabulous. The Shogun's niece is in attendance, as well as a number of international and intergalactic friends she has acquired over her nine years.

Upon her eleventh summer, Yugao finds an old book of her father's and for the first time, realizes that her aspirations to be a space pirate are not unfounded. She sits there for a good five hours in the attic in disbelief, flipping through records and photos of her own father and his many badges and uniforms.

When Yugao is thirteen, her friend offers her a kiseru to smoke. She coughs vigorously the first time she tries to take a drag, her throat and lungs burning, and decides that despite the fact that her mother carries one and uses it, the acrid sensation is not worth anything in her possession.

Yugao is fifteen when she learns that space pirates are scary people. Her mother may be a formidable force, but when the blonde courtesan goes strangely quiet, Yugao knows full well that her mother is simply relinquishing the stage for her father. Zenshi's space pirate face is terrifying. Yugao learns this the first time she brings up the topic of her _boyfriend_.

Seventeen years have passed, and this year is the year her parents gift her a new, soft magenta parasol. As she turns it in her fingers, she relishes the strong grip of the hilt and discovers that her father's family crest is embedded in gold at the base. Her mother gives her hair ornaments, two kunai _kanzashi_, and deems her the heir to Yoshiwara and the Hyakka. This is her coming of age. Yet for some reason, she is still but a child, bursting into overjoyed tears and throwing her arms around her parents because she loves them with the force of a million suns.

* * *

**Notes:**

-Some of these are really difficult to write. Some are fun. Ueaghhh.

-I was thinking about what Tsukuyo said to Zenshi about Yugao's boyfriend. OH how she totally burnneeeddd him with that comment. (see theme **21: "Joy"**)

-Why _is_ Abuto there?! He's like Yoshiwara's number one enemy (besides Kamui lol)

-Limona! Limona's adorable. I doodled her.

-Tabs is Yato!Yamazaki in disguise.

**References:**

-Mr. Paoborin? Totally just a play on Master Pao Pao and Professor Borin, AKA _Reborn_ from KHR.

**Pairings:**

-AINA TOTALLY CALLED IT.


	7. Seven Ten

I should really do my finals work. I have this art self-review essay I have to right...really odd, but okay.

Also: check my dA, there's tons of new **Eyes of Wolves** stuff up! And I plan to go hard core **EoW** fan art this summer!

**Disclaimer: So apparently, in Eyes of Wolves, I named a Hyakka girl "Hotaru". Now literally Sorachi made a Hotaru courtesan who is trying to take over Yoshiwara. I should totally add that. lol. The take over Yoshiwara isn't mine though (insert Kondo laugh here)**

* * *

**One Hundred Times**

_**.: seven ten :.**_

* * *

**61\. Misunderstanding**

"Oh, you must have it wrong," the little Amanto man says. He nervously trails a finger up his twirled ram horns. "We don't offer those services."

"_I_ must have them wrong?" Mei echoes, tapping a nail against the mahogany. "There must be a misunderstanding. I never have it wrong."

It was a tactic that worked for Zenshi, and Zenshi only, because more often than not it was the former lieutenant that had his papers straight and his mind screwed in the right way. And here was Mei, who thought every floating creature in space was a dolphin, and would never be convinced otherwise. Mei had it wrong plenty.

Just not here.

**62\. Ninja**

Hattori Zenzo's pride as a shinobi does not stop short of personal morals and internal will. The day he sees the girl he failed to kidnap, he feels a bizarre sort of relief. He's glad she's alive. He still brings her an issue of Jump every week.

But as soon as someone else fails to carry out their mission, he is on their throat like a jaguar to its prey. When Sarutobi Ayame comes back to base with her tail between her legs, looking like she'd seen a ghost, Zenzo lays down the law.

"The ninja must be as strong as the samurai! Our dogma is as honorable as their bushido! You mustn't back down, Sarutobi." He's snarling; Zenzo discovers that bad mood has been his good partner for the last few weeks.

"You don't understand," Sacchan growls. She, too, has moments of comparable irritation. "He was _right there_."

"Who was?"

"My target, that's who!"

A knock at the door interrupts their strained quarrel. Sacchan whips around with a questioning glance. No one of their shinobi organization is scheduled to arrive, and the base is a location of utmost secrecy.

"I've got it." Zenzo strides to the door and cracks it open a peek. Almost immediately, he leaps backwards, a weapon drawn because the guest pushes the entrance completely open. A cheetah Amanto in a gray pinstripe suit with a document of fine print in his hand. No, two documents.

"I have two papers 'ere, miss," he announces with casual drawl. "One's a warrant fer yer arrest. The other's a search warrant. Pick."

"Arrest? Who are you, the Shinsengumi?" demands Zenzo.

"Nah," replies the cheetah boy. "Just the biggest intergalactic embassy in this city."

Sacchan pushes Zenzo asides and grabs the paper assigning her arrest. And she rips it to shreds.

"Search warrant it is," says the Amanto. "Good pick, miss."

**63\. Puppy**

Zenshi admits that the little, wobbly creature is cute, despite the fact that Tsukuyo teases him about it. After all, what kind of defined Yato man calls something _cute_?

But Lang has paws too big for his body and a tongue that never stops lolling, and Zenshi can't help but reach down and tousle the wolf-dog's ears.

"Is he a wolf pup or just a puppy, like a dog puppy?" asks Seita. "Is there even such thing as a wolf-dog? Isn't he just one or the other?"

"No, the specific species is _wolf-dog_." Zenshi scratches Lang's chin. "An Aokami wolf-dog."

Lang yips and then stumbles on Seita's toe.

"Some wolf-dog," mutters Seita. "He doesn't even know how to walk."

"He'll get big," Zenshi reassures the boy. "Very big."

And sure enough, Lang eventually grows large enough to smother Seita and knock him to the ground with the weight of a small horse.

**64\. Song**

The most pleasant of secrets often arise in the most unexpected of scenes. It's ship karaoke night – because of course such a thing exists – the evening following yet another trip to the admiral's space station, and poor Tabs is shoved up to the microphone as soon as the song changes.

"No, you know, I c-can't sing," Tabs stutters as a large Yato crewman hoists him up to the platform. The microphone is shoved ungracefully into his hands and he cowers there, arms curled to his chest and eyes wide. Someone hoots; he flinches.

"Sure ya can!" hollers Delong, only slightly inebriated. A song intro begins, the guitar a steady strum as lyrics begin appearing on screen.

When the singer's melody begins, the entire cabin's occupants go quiet. Delong and Mei and Jenhao are standing at the edge of Tabs's platform looking stunned beyond comprehension.

They discover that Tabs has one of the nicest singing voices out of all of their division.

**65\. Grandparents**

The day she becomes a grandmother, she demands an immediate leave from her work and literally storms through an entire line of telephone operators and secretaries in her husband's office.

"I'm sorry ma'am, but I can't connect you at the current moment. Please redirect yourself to the main office," a tweedy desk worker's voice sneers at her.

"You don't seem to have received the memo," she nearly spits in her urgency. "I have first priority on this line. Now connect me to his personal telephone."

"I'm _sorry_, ma'am, I _can't_. Unauthorized callers are prohibited from reaching the main line for security reasons." The employee is already tired of this woman, and he has heard only three lines from her.

She's insistent. "Unauthorized? _I'm_ unauthorized? You've got it backwards, son, because _you're_ unauthorized to address me in such a manner. Do you know who's calling? Have someone tell you."

She slams the phone down on the receiver and immediately picks it up again. For the fifth time in a row, she dials her husband's main line, and is intercepted by those stubborn phone operators.

"Ma'am," the same voice snarls, "I can't let you through this phone line."

"Has no one told you, yet?" she demands. All of the other phone operators she has ripped through are now fully aware of her status, hence why she has made it so far through the lines. Her fifth and current call zips immediately to this nasally desk worker because they all recognize her number by now.

"No, and I—"

The voice cuts off suddenly, and she refrains from tearing into him again.

"No, sir, I was not aware." He's not talking to her now.

"Hand the phone over, son. You're dismissed."

She's listening to a conversation on the other end, now, and is pleased to hear a familiar voice.

"It took you long enough, my dear," she sighs when he actually picks up.

"Now tell me, Lanhua, what has you absolutely destroying my phone network?"

"It's worth it, I promise."

"What?"

"We're _grandparents_ today."

**66\. Idle**

Kijima Matako is not an idle woman. She is a top officer within the ranks of the Kiheitai and finds it humiliating that people expect her, as a woman, to be of lesser capability. Meeting Lieutenant Mei of the Harusame was somewhat of a gift. Independent, brave, and as far from a law-abiding citizen as you can get, Mei is everything except submissive to feminine roles. And Matako admires that.

"I'll make a call for you," Mei says, winking. There are many ways to take that gesture, but Matako prefers to ignore it.

"Thanks," she replies gratefully. "I'm counting on you."

"Of course." Mei smiles, throws a casual wave over her shoulder, and ambles back to her ship.

Within twenty-four hours, Kawakami Bansai's charges of first-degree murder are dropped _completely_, and if that is not a blessing on its own then it is a miracle of a higher power. Matako makes it her next mission to ask Mei what kind of underworld strings she pulled to make that happen.

**67\. Weary**

Sometimes he grows weary of the colors. Sciuttla is certainly ideal for vacationing, for the beauty-seeking couple on their honeymoon, but for business? No, not the setting he is looking for. But he puts up with the purple-haired men and the green-skinned ladies, their ludicrous outfit combinations and their pink and yellow polka dot heels. He himself has exchanged his old Harusame uniform for a pale blue _changshan_ and a classy white scarf.

It is a relief, however, when he finds himself on familiar ground — or rather, a familiar ship — where those light clothes are an outstanding burden and he can give them up for the old black Yato robes and dark umbrella.

"Good to see you," Jinlin says quietly.

"Good to see you, too," he agrees.

"What brings you back here?"

Jenhao brandishes a document. "Politics."

She smiles. "Of course. How's your wife?"

"Very well, thank you. Your sister-in-law?"

"Fine."

"The new lieutenant?"

"Less than fine," sighs Jinlin. "But managing. She talks everyone's ear off."

"I'm sure." Jenhao may be weary of Sciuttla, but if there's anything he'll never tire of, it's this crew's unfailing propensity to cheer him up in the dreariest, most tedious of times.

**68\. Puppets**

Mei dislikes the idea of being strung around like some kind of toy, moved about the game board like a disposable pawn. She glowers at Zenshi, who brushes past her casually, that blonde courtesan on his arm. She glares daggers at her sister, who pretends Mei doesn't even exist every time they cross paths.

But most of all, Mei directs her hate at the Hitotsubashi because she knows she is nothing but a puppet to them. A tool. Nobu Nobu wants the Shogun's seat. She is but a rung on the ladder; perhaps she is even a hindrance.

He notices, of course, but never comments. He is well aware of her Yato instinct, her wiliness and her keen perception of his intentions. Her malicious emotion aggregates into something akin to acuity, and it's a trait he admires greatly of the Yato. How brilliantly they channel raw feeling into wit and skill and pure power. But more so in Lieutenant Mei, who bares her fangs without a drop of hesitation, questioning authority will all that is her being.

Nobu Nobu finally speaks when her brooding has quieted to a dull grimace.

"You seem to be acquainted with a number of guests here today," he notes blandly. His intonation is dull for he wishes to indicate that he is inquiring in the most nonthreatening of ways. She is a wild creature, untamable by intimidation alone. Their very first meeting, he had taken an immediate liking to her fiery nature.

"Hardly," Mei snarls. She eyes the top Bakufu officials like she's planning to rip their heads off. "But the same can be said of you."

"Certainly." He follows her gaze, which falls on the Shogun, and then on his four Mimawarigumi guards. They continue their casual walk.

"I do find it interesting that a high class ball is being held in space," she comments.

"Shige Shige doesn't make it a habit to visit extraterrestrial holdings, but this is the annual exception."

"Ridiculous," Mei immediately spits. "It's like he's offering his head to the Tendoshuu."

Nobu Nobu turns to her sharply. "Watch what you say in this environment, Lieutenant."

She grins, a jarringly sweet expression.

"No, Nobu-dono, _you_ should watch _your head_."

**69\. Duel**

Everything in life is either a battle or a dream. Tsukuyo finds that, stumbling over Zenshi's toes, dancing is as much of a fight as actually combat. Her body duels with his as he pushes her into the correct position but she fails to actually follow the rhythm. He keeps telling her she's a natural, but Tsukuyo finds that she is just the opposite.

"You owe me fer this," she mutters beneath her breathe when he sweeps her in another graceful loop. "Anythin' I ask."

"Of course," he answers smoothly. Though Tsukuyo has hardly ever danced much in her life, she can tell that he is a superb lead in each step. It's true that she can catch onto a motion easily — rock back with her right foot, come back on her left — despite her incompatibility with the actual cohesive rhythm, but it's his steady hand that guides her. She never understands how, but the slight pressures of his hand and the way he guides her into a turn or a close hold is unbelievably smooth.

"Anythin'," she repeats emphatically.

"Loosen up and just turn the way I turn you." His left hand guides her right in some sort of twist that brings her back to his chest as if they're spooning, and as soon as she rocks back with her right foot she finds that they sway together in that same motion, only now facing the same direction. "And yes, anything."

"Ya can't say no."

"I won't say no."

"Promise?" She lets him twirl her back around to their original position. Tsukuyo decides she likes this one — he informs her that it's the swing — because her hands are delicately placed in his and she isn't caught up in the standard ballroom dance position that will never cease to baffle her.

"Promise."

**70\. Pool**

The first time Seita narrates his pool adventures, Zenshi quickly deduces that it was a good thing he didn't go with them that day. But when Seita's nonstop clamor indicates that _everyone_ will accompany him on his second trip.

"It was _so_ much fun," he exclaims, tugging on Zenshi's sleeve enthusiastically. "You _have_ to come with us this time!"

From tales of waterslides slick with body lotion (why lotion?) to the escapades of the Shogun's stretchy underpants, there is much to be told about the Greater Edo Pool. Seita leaves out no details, all the way to the entrance of the building.

The distinctive pool chlorine scent wafts potently from the building doors, which harbor a humid environment unlike any other. The only aberration is the frantic action of the lifeguards, all clad in blue cloaks. One whirls around, spots them, and goes pale.

"Why are _you_ here again?!" he hollers, looking frustrated.

"Whaddaya mean what're we doin' here?" Tsukuyo quips snappishly. She folds her arms and Seita copies her.

The silver-haired lifeguard throws Zenshi a pleading look and mouths, _help me,_ before being dragged away by an animated red-haired Yato girl and a pair of glasses with a human torso and appendages.

Before Zenshi can even mention that this is a bad idea, Tsukuyo reads his mind and grabs the sleeve of his ridiculously large Hawaiian shirt.

"Ya can't say no," she warns, "you promised."

"Indeed I did." Zenshi grimaces.

And so they beat on, Shogun's swim cap flailing against the current, borne back ceaselessly into slippery chaos.

* * *

**Notes: **

-the ninja one was difficult to write...?

-Lanhua you ought to have your own personal red telephone line to your own husband...

-Bansai you'd better thank the lord and Zenshi thrice before you return to your ship

-CAN YOU TELL I JUST RE-WATCHED THE POOL EPISODE? :D

**References:**

-"Aokami" (+ the wolf part) are direct references to my forever on hiatus and forever unfinished story, **Emeralds**.

-Dancing: 1) I liked the theme, 2) I took a lesson and learned the swing with my dad and it was really fun. ;)

-OH MAN. MAN OH MAN. **The last line! **The last line is a parody of the last line in **The Great Gatsby**** !****  
**

...I hope you saw that one haha. I had fun with it.

AND POOLS!

**Pairings:**

-Nobu Nobu is a smart, smart man. But Mei is a clever girl. Too bad it doesn't work out for them. #cryforever

-Shogun x his pants


	8. Eight Ten

Sorry it's been so long since the last update! Things are HECTIC. I joined the FMA fandom in the meantime, though.

ALL RIGHT HERE WE GO.

**News: EYES OF WOLVES OFFICIAL COVER UP ON DEVIANTART**

**Disclaimer: **Gintama isn't mine because apparently Sho-chan was decapitated?! (aka this chapter will have subtle spoilers for the newest chapters)

* * *

**One Hundred Times**  


_**.: eight ten :.**_

* * *

**71\. Chess**

"He doesn't need a chess piece that serves no purpose," the man croaks hoarsely. He's on his death bed, fingers gripping the hospital sheets with the last of his strength. "I'm sure you understand."

But the woman that watches him is stoic and unyielding, gazing with a stark finality that awaits his death. She is pale and porcelain, elegant and smooth, a curtain of ebony hair falling like a sheet of silk past her shoulder blades.

"Kill me now," he begs.

"I shall not," she abjures, "lest I return to the surface a murderer."

"Don't let a poor man suffer."

"I'm no angel."

"But you're an Angel of Death," he prompts. His lungs are failing him; he feels limp. There is little merit in asking for a quick death because he is already dying, and fast.

"The devil," Jinlin says, leaning in close before the man gasps his final breath, "is a woman."

**72\. Honey**

Zenshi is not a man that admits to jealousy openly or easily. In fact, he bites into silence with jaws as stiff as a horse with tetanus. It writhes in him like any other emotion, but his face is plastered plain and he descends into the fumes of Yoshiwara without a word.

Hotaru had been a decent girl. If he wasn't mistaken, she had accompanied them to Sciuttla and back. He recalled a sweet smile and impossibly glossy, short hair – that is, if he was remembering the right girl.

He pushes into the mess of the love drug aftermath, shoving aside men clad in very little or nothing at all. When he finally reaches Hinowa's place, Tsukuyo is leaning on the upper balcony alone, her kiseru between her lips. She glances down with surprise in her lavender eyes, as if startled to see him there.

"How was your day, _honey_?" Zenshi asks flatly.

"J-Just fine." The blonde courtesan removes her pipe from her mouth, narrowing her eyes. His voice is caustic in demeanor, but not tone. Unbeknownst to Zenshi, Tsukuyo has become a master at reading him and is far from pleased to see him subtly scowling at her. "How was yers?" she replies, bolder now.

"_Swell_." Zenshi closes his parasol and shoves the hook on his belt, stepping into the parlor without another word.

Tsukuyo waits for a moment, but doesn't hear him coming upstairs. With a start, she makes half a grimace and half a smile, realizing his discomfort's origins. The scented smoke from her _kiseru_ wafts past her as a draft passes by.

_He's jealous_, she thought, almost glibly. What a ridiculous thought. _What a ridiculous thought._

**73\. Flowers**

The boy has a bouquet of flowers in his hands – finely arranged, sweet, and bursting with springtime enthusiasm. He dresses neatly, in dress pants and shirt, loafers, and an argyle vest. Black hair swept back cleanly and tied in its usual tail, Yugao's date is spiffy and flawless.

Tsukuyo welcomes him like she welcomes any guest. Hinowa graciously offers him a vase, but he refuses to put them down until Yugao receives them. Instead, he offers Hinowa a hand with her tasks as they wait.

Zenshi crosses his arms and waits. The boy is all but intimidated by the tall Yato man. Young, bright, with straight white teeth and exuberant confidence, Katsura's boy is vibrant. There is nothing Zenshi can really pick a bone with, yet he is still overprotective and judgmental.

But truth be told, Zenshi has already accepted the boy. It had been a long time since he came to terms with his fatherly possessiveness. And it was just in the nick of time, because two weeks later, on a rainy night, one soaked ramen shop owner's son came beckoning at his door, asking for his daughter's hand.

Yugao is twenty-six. He is twenty-eight.

Zenshi had quite the things to say when Yugao, at fifteen, had traipsed away with the boy. But seeing as the black-haired lad has stayed around for a decade and plus some, Zenshi supposes he's here to stay. And he's rather good at what he does, too.

Yugao finally descends, delighted at the flowers.

The boy touches his pocket gently, as if to make sure the ring he's spent ages saving up for is actually there, and then offers his arm.

And then, for the first time, when he turns to Zenshi, the father of his hopefully soon-to-be fiancée smiles at him.

**74\. Circles**

Tsukuyo straddles him on the futon, knees on either side of his waist. She admires his chest and smooth, toned, hard abdomen with both hands.

"Ya need some sleep," she comments absently, glancing at the dark circles beneath his eyes. Her hands roam further down, a thumb brushing the waistband of his sleep pants.

"And it sure looks like you're going to let me go straight to bed," he deadpans sardonically. After all, Tsukuyo probably _is_ the cause of those dark circles.

**75\. Companion**

For every Joui patriot (with the exception of one Katsura Kotarou), there is a Yato companion. Gintoki finds himself in the presence of the great Kagura, Sakamoto should thank his stars for Mutsu, and Takasugi simply happened to find the chaos-seeking Kamui. As for Elizabeth, no one knows what that thing even is. Still.

However, there are also courtesan kunoichi wearing spiked heels that prefer the company of the Yato, and they know one thing for sure:

The Yato, too, have their own companions.

For Kamui, it would be the ever-patient watchdog, Abuto.

For Mutsu, it is her not-so-captain-like captain, the Joui patriot (needy puppy) Sakamoto.

For Kagura, she has big, fluffy, sometimes man-eating Sadaharu.

And, for Tsukuyo and Zenshi, there is Lang to wolf-dog.

And Lang the wolf-dog has recently grown to unprecedented sizes. But, thankfully, he finds a companion in fellow giant canine, Sadaharu, and the two go trekking in the park and destroying all that is beautiful in Edo.

"I never imagined he would grow so large," Zenshi muses to himself, watching the dark wolf-dog snuffle at Sadaharu's collar.

"I'm just prayin' he doesn't keep growin'," Tsukuyo mutters back.

And fortunately, he doesn't.

**76\. Keepsake**

There is a dress code, but at the same time there is not. All officers are expected to dress neatly and in typical attire – the girl who tried to exotically cut her Yato-style dress at the midriff had not been the brightest bulb on the boat – comfortable and serviceable shoes are required, there are no policies on hair dye, and excessive jewelry is banned.

However, jewelry _is_ favored on a less extravagant level. Most crewmen have earrings or pendants; keepsakes.

Zenshi, for one, wears a single, blocked ring on each ear, two pieces made of obsidian. Mei occasionally deviates from her similarly single, black loops and teeny pearls for gold, dangling hoops, but she prefers not to because they remind her of her sister. Tabs has a silver ear cuff that resembles a ribbed seashell. Jenhao and Delong both wear plain marriage bands on their ring fingers, the latter also sporting simple black studs in his ears.

The only member of Zenshi's crew that wears a more colored piece of jewelry is Jinlin. Two jade earrings, laid in gold offsets, in teardrop shapes. They dangle lightly from her earlobes, nondescript and very much in her style. Abuto never forgets to drop a compliment when her _changshan_ happens to match them, but she pays him no attention.

Apparently, her father (and Delong's uncle) had given them to her before he passed. The day she misplaces them is the day she breaks her stoic, tirelessly blank expression and panics.

It's noon by ship time, cruising to the Harusame main space station for annual checkups and repairs. Just six hours ago, they'd been manning the cannons and sweeping through layer after layer of resistance forces as per their job of "cleaning up" after the Harusame. Jinlin spent the night exhausted with the aftermath, getting only two hours of sleep before her alarm loudly and rudely announced the start of her daily shift.

But, as a good crewwoman does, she reports for duty in a brisk, timely manner, her swift and elegant demeanor showing nothing of her sudden unease.

_I didn't take them off yesterday, did I?_ Jinlin wonders inwardly. She doesn't recall setting them down; she never had the time to.

Zenshi casts her a curious glance.

"Petty officer?"

"Yes, sir?"

"The papers."

She glances down and realizes her hands are clutching the stack of papers he needs to review.

"Oh. Right away, sir." She unclips the stack and passes it to the lieutenant, who gently pushes aside her brief absentmindedness as nothing. As soon as he is working, Jinlin slips out the door for her next task, brooding on the way to the main tech's office.

Yesterday.

She had run interference by the port wing to delay the temperamental chief warrant officer who had mistakenly been put in charge there. They were to hold off on their attack until 0130, allowing the ammunition barge sent by Division 3 to catch up on their starboard side and replenish the fourth ship. Jinlin remembered that she first ran to report to Mei, who had hurriedly recorded the order and sprinted back up to main command. She hadn't bumped into anyone else, had she?

Tabs. Jinlin had bumped into Tabs. The boy had been running tech repairs all night, and the two tired officers quite literally crashed into one another. Perhaps her earrings had miraculously dropped during the collision.

Jinlin retraces her steps anxiously, taking a brief detour from her task. No one is in the hall, so she kneels quickly and surveys the area. Her keen eyes find nothing. Disappointed, she continues on her way to the tech room, hoping that Tabs might be of some help.

"Nope, haven't seen'em," he says, frowning. "Did ya check the hall? They might be o'er there, yes?"

Tabs is definitely tired. The last few years had conditioned him into a fine officer, with a more mature outlook – most of the time – an affinity for computer science (surprising those who knew his humble backgrounds), and crisp, proper speech, but right now there are dark circles hanging like hammocks beneath his eyes and he has lapsed into his old Yato accent, the countryside one to boot.

"I already have. Thanks, though." Jinlin quietly hands him her report, which he takes in practically slow motion. She slips outside again. Her precious earrings are lost. Completely lost.

She checks a ship clock and realizes that she is running horribly late. Quickening the pace, she rounds the corner and slams straight into someone's hard chest.

Both stagger backwards.

"My bad—"

"I am—"

There is an exasperated silence that passes between Jinlin and Delong, who rubs his stubbly chin and smiles.

"Some observant Yato we are," he snorts derisively.

"Indeed," she agrees. "I'm a little late, so I'll be going."

Almost immediately, he catches the restless chord that rings in her tone and grasps her wrist.

"Something wrong, Bev?" He always addresses her by her nickname, one that she isn't sure she likes. Beverly never sounded like it fit a woman like her.

"It's fine. Just stressed with little sleep."

"I see." He lets go of her arm but his eyes fly to her face. "Your earrings."

Sighing, Jinlin relents. Her cousin always had a knack for knowing what was up. They were practically siblings, after all. When Jinlin's father died to a particularly nasty strain of influenza the doctors could not restrain, she had lived with Delong. They'd gone to school and enlisted together.

Before she says a thing, he frowns and shakes his head. Not disappointed, but more like worried.

"Have you asked Chip? He has a keen eye for placing Lost and Found items with their owners."

"No, but that's a good idea." Jinlin thanks her cousin, who pats her shoulder reassuringly, and continues on her way. Chip the do-all seaman seems like a good resource for lost item searching. He's a part-time lab tech, assistant case studies investigator, and prison guard. Certainly, the scruffy brunet Yato gets around.

Jinlin, deep in thought, is about to turn another corner and crash yet again when a pair of hands shoots out and seizes her abruptly by the shoulders.

"Be careful, Jinlin." It's Jenhao; his soft voice always manages to sound at peace, and she is not sure how he does it. "You okay?"

"Yes." She blinks a few times and smiles flatly.

"Ah. No you're not." He reaches into his pocket. "I think I know why."

He produces two gold drop jade earrings and places them in her palm.

"Found them in central command. Actually, the vice-captain did."

"Oh." She is speechless, but smiling broadly. Jenhao is tempted to tell her to smile more, but it's not his place to do so. "I guess," she says, "I'll go tell him thank you."

"I'm sure he'll like that." Jenhao grins and dodges around her to continue his own job.

"I'm sure he will."

**77\. Roleplay**

"Yer under arrest," Tsukuyo declares. She spins Zenshi around – she is alarmingly strong for her slim build – and pushes him against the wall, pinning his wrists behind his back.

"For what, exactly?" He glances at her over his shoulder, amused.

"Fer violatin' the law of this room," she tells him, her lips curling into a smile.

"I wasn't aware we had laws in this room, officer," Zenshi drawls, muffled because she takes one hand and presses his face to the wall.

"What an ignorant citizen y'are, Zen," she says in mock anger. "It's the most well known law in this humble abode."

"Apparently not, since I don't know it. Will you let me go?"

"Will you let me go, _what?_"

He snorts inwardly, rolling his eyes. "Will you let me go, _ma'am_."

She pauses, as if considering the idea. Her tongue traces the edge of her lips, as if tasting a slip of nonexistent icing she'd missed.

"How about…no."

Her hands are clasped tightly around his wrists as she leans forward and presses herself against him seductively.

"I won't let ya off with just a ticket," she whispers.

He throws her a suggestive glance. "That's not a big deal, officer. But I really would like you to tell me this all-powerful law."

"Oh it _is_ all-powerful," she says, smirking. "I'll give you a hint."

Tsukuyo lifts one hand and tugs at his collar.

"You're not supposed to be wearing clothes."

**78\. Excitement**

"I'm going to win this bet," Kamui announces to no one in particular.

"What are the winnings?" one of the younger, newer officers brazenly asks. He's around Kamui's age – most of the new recruits are – and he clearly thinks he's hit it off well with their captain. Jinlin and Mei scoff inwardly at this, the former inwardly and the latter outwardly.

"Well, it's more like a competition." Kamui strokes his chin thoughtfully. A goofy grin appears on his face momentarily before it is capped by his bloodlust.

"Who can make more kills on the operation?" the seaman asks.

"That, and who can off the shogun first." Kamui beams.

"You already half-killed the almost-shogun," Abuto says exasperatedly. "Can't you just settle with that?"

"No, Shinsuke said I wasn't supposed to do that."

"Since when do _you_ take orders?" Mei snorts, amused. She crosses her legs and spins in her rolling chair.

"I _don't_." Kamui shoots her a dangerous glance. "He's kind of fun to be with. I get to kill people."

"That is _so_ you," Mei sings.

"Careful, Lieutenant." Abuto follows up Kamui's death glare with one of his own.

"All right. Well, at least brief me on the plans," Mei says, pointing to the array of papers they have spread across the strategies table.

"I thought the blondie told you," Kamui replied.

"Who, Matako? Nah, she needs to be briefed, too. You guys are crazy."

"Crazy can be good," the seaman says. No one pays him much attention, but he doesn't seem to notice. "In fact, I—"

"Sir," Jinlin cuts in flatly, "incoming call from Kawakami Bansai."

"Abuto will take it," chirps Kamui. His second-in-command sighs dramatically and connects his personal earpiece to the inter-ship calling line, swiveling his chair away.

"With all due respect," Mei says – sincerely meaning she has no respect at all – with a smile, "you should watch out for the samurai."

"I'm glad we can state the obvious, Lieutenant Mei." Kamui smiles his cold smile. "I'm cheerful, not _dumb_."

"_Cold_," hisses the seaman. Mei shoots him a glower.

"Who knows," Mei continues, "maybe your sister has a badass samurai boyfriend."

And then, very quickly, she gathers her papers, escapes Abuto when he tries to get her to take the rest of the call, and avoids Kamui's eyes throwing daggers at her back.

**79\. Inconclusive**

"This," he says, "looks like a job for me."

"Zura, _no_." Gintoki grabs his friend by the wrist and pulls him away. "We're not going through this again."

"So, everybody!" exclaims Katsura, completely ignoring the silver-haired samurai. "Just follow me!"

"This is going to end badly," grumbles Gintoki, tightening his grip on the other man's arm. "Protesting outside the biggest embassy in Edo? Even _I'm_ not that stupid! Zura? You listenin'? Fine, go kaboom for all I care!"

"We need a little controversy," reasons Katsura.

"No, we don't."

"You know, Gintoki, I'm beginning to feel like a Rap God."

"Turn around Zura, and—wait, what?" They're already surrounded by Amanto agents; their good friend Blue is staring at them from a window, somewhat amused. "Hey Blue, a little help? My good Yato friend who has shared a million drinks with me?"

They're total lies, but Gintoki wants everything but another run-in with the Shinsengumi.

"All my people from the front to back nod, back nod."

"What."

Katsura smiles, whistles loudly, and lets a flying Elizabeth whisk him away.

"See you again, Gintoki!"

"_Zura!_" Gintoki hollers as an Amanto grabs his arm. "_Why Eminem?! Why American rap?!_"

"It's not rap, it's Katsurap!"

**80\. Jump**

"Here, have a copy of Jump," Hattori Zenzou offers casually. Zenshi declines politely, folding his hand atop his mahogany desk and staring down the shinobi. The human's eyes are concealed; he wears a constant mask despite his open demeanor.

"What brings you to my office, leader of the Oniwabanshuu?"

Hattori closes the issue of jump he'd so immersed his attention in. He uncrosses his legs and leans forward.

"You…have a connection to the Harusame, do you not?"

* * *

**References: **There's an FMA (Jean Havoc) reference in the first, lol.

Okay, Hattori better have something up his sleeve...

**EYES OF WOLVES**: The cover features Kamui, Abuto, Linter, Lanhua, Mutsu,

obviously Zenshi and Tsukuyo,

Mei, Tabs, Jinlin, Delong, Linter, and a younger version of Zenshi.

Check it out! Links on my profile page.


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